Ain’t She Tweet
Will Leitch, normally known for his snarkiness at the great sports blog Deadspin, has a great article about Twitter at New York Magazine, where he serves as a contributing editor.
The piece really comes to no conclusions, but features some interesting observations about the site. I have had a Twitter account for a few months now and have mixed feelings about the service. It’s kind of cool to follow updates from some people and organizations, but it also seems silly a lot of times, especially since some people – and I am guilty of this – use Twitter to update their Facebook status. I follow some of the same people on both sites so it’s kind of redundant.
As Leitch compares and contrasts Twitter with the late 1990s tech companies that imploded, he also also looks at how the sharing of information has changed.
Are we really becoming a nation of people who reflexively share information with everyone the minute we have it? We might be. Twitter has no choice but to hope so. They might be right.
Leitch goes to examine how the plane crash in the Hudson proved this as eyewitnesses provided “tweets” with information and photos almost right away. The article then goes on to examine the difficulty of that turning into a money-making venture.
My one complaint about the article is that Leitch has, at his fingertips, an example of why Twitter faces an uphill climb. Sure, a guy used Twitter to circulate a pretty powerful photo of passengers waiting to get rescued from the Hudson River. The picture got lots of publicity, but no one made any money.
Just a few weeks later, a guy (or woman, not sure) sold a photo of Michael Phelps taking bong hit in South Carolina. Again, lots of publicity, but also a financial transaction. While a bunch of us might be sharing info virtually, there is still something to be said about good old-fashioned newspapers, even those who sleazily pay for photos to stir some controversy.
Like Leitch, I have rambled (although not as eloquently) and don’t have much of a point except that Twitter really does have an uphill climb, but it is completely out of their hands. They can try and develop a revenue model to make money, but there are existing technologies, some of them really old, which already have that going for them.
Dave Lifton
February 9, 2009“Are we really becoming a nation of people who reflexively share information with everyone the minute we have it?”
No disrespect to Leitch, because he was a great interview, but isn’t that a large part of Deadspin’s success? People sending in pictures of athletes getting drunk or hitting on college girls as soon as they happen?
Aaron S.
February 9, 2009Dave, I think Will was focusing on the sharing of personal information. That’s what makes Twitter and facebook statuses so strange. Everyone understands the tabloid appeal of famous person X doing dumb act Y. No one really questions that anymore.
What I think Will and I fail to understand (despite experimenting with it) is why people feel the need to tell everyone what they are doing at any given moment. Twitter is to this question what Funyuns are to stoner food – the simple dissolved essence of the concept. I have yet to use twitter and completely fail to see the commercial application for it.